Search results

In an attempt to enrich the literature of the efficiency of Islamic banks, this study aims to empirically investigate the efficiency of the fully fledged Islamic banks as well as Islamic windows in Malaysia.

This study measures the technical and cost‐efficiencies of these banks using the non‐parametric frontier method, data envelopment analysis (DEA).

The findings show that, on average, the efficiency of the overall Islamic banking industry has increased during the period of study. The study also revealed that, although the fully fledged Islamic banks were more efficient than the Islamic windows, they were still less efficient than the conventional banks. Finally, Islamic windows of the foreign banks were found to be more efficient than Islamic windows of the domestic banks.

The findings of this study will provide some empirical insights as to how these two modes of Islamic banks had fared in the competitive environment from 1997 to 2003.

In line with the IFSB and BCBS methodology, the purpose of this study is to undertake a comparative analysis of dual banking systems for asset-liability management (ALM) practices with the duration gap, in Islamic Commercial Banks (ICBs) and Conventional Commercial Banks (CCBs). Based on the research objective, two research questions are developed: How do the duration gaps of ICBs compare with those of similar sized CCBs? Are there any country-specific and regional differences among ICBs in terms of managing their duration gaps?

The research methodology comprises two-stages: stage one uses a duration gap model to calculate the duration gaps of ICBs and CCBs; stage two applies parametric tests. In terms of the duration gap model, the study determines the duration gap with a four-step process. The study selected a sample of 100 banks (50 ICBs and 50 CCBs) from 13 countries for the period 2009-2015.

The paper provides empirical insights into the duration gap and ALM of ICBs and CCBs. The ICBs have more variations in their mean duration gap compared to the CCBs, and they have a tendency for a higher (more) mean duration gap (28.37 years) in comparison to the CCBs (11.79 years). The study found ICBs as having 2.41 times more duration gap compared to the CCBs, and they are exposed to increasing rate of return (ROR) risk due to their larger duration gaps and severe liquidity mismatches. There are significant regional differences in terms of the duration gap and asset-liability management.

Future studies also consider “Off-Balance Sheet” activities of the ICBs, with multi-term duration measures. A larger sample size of 100 ICBs with 10 years’ data after the GFC would be more beneficial to the industry. In addition, the impact of an increasing benchmark rate (e.g. 100, 200 and 300 bps) on the ICBs as per the IFSB 20 per cent threshold can also be established with the duration gap approach to identify the vulnerabilities of the ICBs.

The study makes profound contributions to the literature and suggests various policy recommendations for Islamic banks, regulators, and standard setters of the ICBs, for identifying and measuring the significance of the duration gaps; and management of the ROR risk under Pillar 2 of the BCBS and IFSB, for financial soundness and stability purposes.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is a pioneer study in Islamic banking involving a sample of 100 banks (50 ICBs and 50 CCBs) from 13 countries. The results of the study provide original empirical evidence regarding the estimation of duration gap, and variations across jurisdictions in terms of vulnerability of ICBs and CCBs in dual banking systems.

This paper aims to assess the nature of competition between conventional and Islamic banks operating in Malaysia. It is an effort to enrich the existing literature by offering an empirical compromise on the differences in the results of studies related to competition between the two types of banks.

Secondary data on all banks operating in Malaysia’s diversified banking sector is collected from the FitchConnect database for the period 2011-2017. A non-structural measure of competition (H-statistic) as informed by Panzar–Rosse is used to measure the competition between conventional and Islamic banks. Panel data analysis techniques are used to estimate H-statistic. Wald test for the market structure of perfect competition/monopoly is used to affirm the validity and consistency of the results.

The findings of this study signify that the Malaysian banking sector operated under monopolistic competition during the period of study. The long-run equilibrium condition holds for the Malaysian banking sector. Competition among conventional banks is more intense than that among Islamic banks. Financial reform endeavours of Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) along with the liberalisation wave of the financial system were successful in promoting competition, rendering the financial system contestable, resilient and dynamic.

Regulators and policymakers may find the results beneficial in terms of rethinking the number of banks operating in the Islamic sector. The number of banks, however, is not the only determinant of competition in the banking sector. Implications of competition change for stability and risk-taking behaviour of banks should be considered.

Within the context of Malaysia’s diversified banking system, given the contradictory results reported in studies on competition, this study is an effort to provide a plausible middle ground. It suggests a possible answer as to why competition nature has not changed since the policy change initiatives of BNM, namely, banks merger, expansion of Islamic banking operation scope and liberalisation process.

This study aims to propose a risk management framework for Islamic banks to address specific risks that are unique to Islamic bank settings.

A unique methodology has been developed first by exploring the dynamics and behaviors of various risks unique to Islamic banks. Second, it integrates them through a series of diagrams that show how they behave, integrate and impact risk, returns and portfolios.

This study proposes a unique risk-return relationship framework encompassing specific risks faced by Islamic banks under the ambit of portfolio theory showing how Islamic banks establish a steeper risk-return path under Shariah compliance. By doing so, this study identifies a unique “Islamic risk-return” nexus in Islamic settings as an explanation for the concern of contemporary researchers that Islamic banks are more risky than conventional banks.

The originality of this study is that it extends the scope of risk management in Islamic banks from individual contract-based to an integrated whole, identifying a unique transmission path of how risks affect portfolio diversification in Islamic banks.

This paper aims to present a comparative examination of the historical and current profiles of the insurance and takaful industry in the Gulf region. Meanwhile, it will provide overview and insightful information of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries for insurance and takaful providers for their marketing strategy purpose.

This paper uses insurance and takaful sectors in Gulf region as an exploring area where the data are extracted from the regulators’ annual reports and other reports issued by research houses and market players, e.g. Islamic Financial Services Industry, Swiss Re and Milliman.

The comparative analysis reveals that insurance activities penetrated the Gulf region through foreign institutions. After independence and booming oil prices, local institutions established the industry in an unregulated environment. As the industry grew and matured, the sector gradually became regulated. This supported the growth of the industry, leading to the emergence of the biggest takaful market in the world, with 72 takaful operators. Almost half of the takaful operators operate in the Saudi market. Regarding business lines, general lines dominated because of compulsory motor insurance for all cars and health insurance for expatriates. Insurance penetration and insurance density recorded a low figure in GCC compared to the global market because of a lack of product development, especially in family line, which many people think the life insurance contradicts Islamic law. Furthermore, it is low due to the poor channel of distributions with depend heavily on insurance agents that fails to reach the customers.

Interestingly, the takaful market share is considered very low, e.g. 9 per cent in Oman 9 and 9.2 per cent in UAE, where the majority of population is Muslim, indicating that takaful providers should focus in these countries to grab better market shares.

As takaful business is an emerging area in Islamic finance and many insurance players are interested in it, this paper provides an overview and marketing insights of insurance and takaful industries in the GCC region.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is considered one of the crucial branding and promotional tools for banks to legitimise their role in society to become socially and environmentally responsible corporate citizen. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of CSR on stock price volatility of the US banks. This study further examined the moderating role of tax on the relationship between CSR and stock price volatility.

This study uses the random-effects panel regression estimation technique to test the hypotheses. The authors include a sample of 37 US banks from 2013 to 2017 with 144 bank-years observation. The authors consider the environmental, social and governance (ESG) scores from Refinitiv as a proxy for CSR. The financial data are also collected from the Refinitiv Datastream database.

This study finds a significant and positive relationship between CSR and stock price volatility, which indicates that shareholders of the US banks may not prefer excess concentration on CSR because of the additional cost of investment associated with implementing CSR. Also, tax payments and stock price volatility show a significant positive association, which implies that there is a higher possibility of an increase in stock price volatility if the tax rate increases. Generally, shareholders are not interested in paying more taxes, so they may swap the market instead of paying more tax. On the other hand, the authors find a non-significant moderating effect of tax payment on CSR-volatility nexus.

Previous studies mainly focussed on CSR and financial performance of banks. Conversely, studies focussing on CSR and stock volatility are limited. This study will fill the gap in the literature by considering the effect of CSR on the stock price volatility of the US banks.

The purpose of this paper is to propose models of duration for maturity gap risk management in Islamic banks.

A thorough review of literature on duration modeling, duration measurement in Islamic banks and Shariah compliance has been conducted to set parameters to develop Shariah-compliant maturity gap risk management mechanism.

Models based on durations of earning assets and return bearing liabilities using various rates of return earned and paid, benchmark rates and industry standards commonly used by Islamic and conventional banks.

Increased Shariah compliance has threefold impact. Firstly, it will increase trust of customers. Secondly, it will help improve profitability by reducing non-Shariah compliance penalties from the regulators. And finally, it will enhance market capitalization and returns stability to investors because of enhanced customer base, increased level of trust and increased profitability.

This research proposes Shariah-compliant maturity gap risk management models based on the concept of duration according to recommendations of Bank for International Settlements. As there is no such maturity gap risk management mechanism that meets the requirements of Shariah using benchmarks that are common between Islamic and conventional banks; therefore, this research presents risk management solutions that can be applied simultaneously in the entire banking sector.

The main purpose of this research is to figure out the most effective determinants that play a vital role in enhancing the effectiveness of the internal Sharīʿah audit in the Islamic banking industry.

This paper reviews the existing literature to build comprehensive knowledge that would assist in determining the main factors that impact on the effectiveness of Sharīʿah audit in Islamic banks.

This research proposes a conceptual framework of factors that impact on Sharīʿah audit effectiveness in IBs based on previously published studies. The proposed framework includes external and internal factors as well as internal Sharīʿah audit structure, process and requirements.

First, the regulators need to provide a detailed framework for Sharīʿah audit which covers the main requirements for effective Sharīʿah governance. Second, Islamic financial institutions (IFIs) need to pay more attention to following the Sharīʿah audit process in order to achieve the objective of effective Sharīʿah governance. Finally, the dearth of empirical research on the role and effectiveness of Sharīʿah audit in Islamic banking highlights the need to develop an appropriate methodology to enhance the study of the effectiveness of Sharīʿah governance practices.

The Sharīʿah ensures compliance with its rules and regulations and enhances the soundness and credibility of the Islamic finance industry. This study identifies a number of issues that require further investigation in order to establish a better system of Sharīʿah audit and to identify the factors that affect Sharīʿah auditing practices. This paper is unique in covering the main elements that have influence on the effectiveness of Sharīʿah audit and proposes them in one framework.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of capital adequacy ratio (CAR) prescribed in Basel III on the risk-taking behaviour of Islamic and conventional commercial banks in Malaysia. It also investigates the claim that the risk-taking behaviour of Islamic banks (IBs) and conventional banks (CBs) managers is identically influenced by CAR.

Secondary data for all CBs operating in the Malaysian banking sector are gathered from FitchConnect database for the 2011–2017 period. Both dynamic ordinary least squares and generalised method of moments techniques are used to estimate a panel data of 43 commercial banks, namely, 17 IBs and 26 CBs.

The findings of this study lend support to the favourable influence of CAR set in Basel III accord on risk-taking behaviour of both types of banks. CBs appeared to be remarkably better off in terms of capital buffers. Evidence is established on the identicality of the risk-taking behaviour of IBs and CBs managers under CAR influence.

Even though a high CAR is observed to hamper risk-taking of banks, the findings may serve as a signal to regulators to be mindful of the implications of holding a high CAR. Similarly, managers may capitalise on the findings in terms of strategising for efficient use of the considerable capital buffers. Shareholders are also concerned about managers’ use of the considerable capital buffers.

This study is among a few studies that endeavoured to provide empirical evidence on the claim that IBs mimic the conduct of CBs in light of the influence of CAR prescribed in Basel III on risk-taking behaviour, particularly banks operating within the same banking environment.

This study aims to identify the internal and external factors affecting the financial performance of general takaful companies operating in Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, UAE, Qatar and Pakistan, using an unbalanced panel data set consisting of 53 companies.

Data were hand-collected from the official financial reports of takaful companies. Two performance measures, namely, net investment income and investment yield, are used to capture the different aspects of the takaful investment operations. Based on relevant theory and literature, these measures are related to three economic variables, namely, GDP per capita, equity returns and interest rate, and four company-specific variables, namely, company size, gross contributions, retakaful dependence and liquidity. An ordinary least squares regression model, fixed-effects model and random-effects model are estimated for both performance measures.

The study finds that company size, liquidity, retakaful dependence, GDP per capita, equity returns and interest rate are statistically significant determinants of the financial performance; company size, GDP per capita, equity returns and interest rate are positively related to performance, whereas liquidity and retakaful dependence are negatively related to performance.

In the takaful literature, studies have been directed to almost every aspect of the Shariah law governing takaful. Yet, the empirical evidence on the financial performance of global takaful is scarce. Hence, there are several aspects where this paper extends prior research and contributes to the takaful literature.